The Parnell Commission was equally ugly. During April, {303} 1887, the _Times_ newspaper published a series of articles which endeavoured to prove that the Nationalist party were responsible for agrarian outrages of the worst kind. On the 18th of the month it printed what professed to be a letter from Parnell. If genuine, the letter showed that Parnell, while publicly disapproving of the Phoenix Park murders, privately defended them. As a matter of fact, it had been forged by a man named Pigott, and the proprietor of the _Times_ had bought it with such credulity as showed that he was completely reckless in his eagerness to injure Parnell. In November an action was brought against the _Times_ by another Nationalist, and the Attorney-General, who acted for the defendants, produced in court a number of other letters of the same kind. Parnell then took action. He had been advised by English Liberals that the verdict of a London jury would be cast, from political motives, against him. He had known that a verdict on the other side from a Dublin jury would get no credit out of Ireland. He had therefore declined to issue a writ for libel. He now demanded an inquiry by a Select Committee of the House of Commons. The Tories, who believed the letter to be genuine, refused the Committee, but promised to establish a Commission of three judges "to inquire into the allegations and charges made against Members of Parliament by the defendants in the recent action." This was accepted by Parnell instead of a Select Committee. But the Government, without his consent, inserted the words "and other persons" after the word "Parliament," and thus turned a particular inquiry into the conduct of members into a roving investigation into Irish politics of the last ten years. Members of Parliament, boycotters, defaulting tenants, moonlighters, murderers, and maimers of cattle were all lumped together for examination by a body which was incapable by its nature of giving weight to the historical and economic condition of Ireland. Whether Parnell had expressed approval of murder or not was a question of fact which could be settled by a court of law better than by any one else. The rights and wrongs of England and Ireland could not be tried by {304} any tribunal upon earth, and Parnell's case was huddled up with the rest simply in the hope that general prejudice against proved outrage might outweigh the effect of an acquittal on the particular charge. Nothing would be settled by proving that the National League had promoted outrage. The case for the League was that it was the only means of obtaining justice for the Irish peasant. No judge, however impartial, could try such an issue. The Bill establishing the Commission was forced through the House, without the excuse of urgency, by the use of the closure. Parnell was thus compelled to accept a tribunal for which he had not asked, in order that the Tory party might find judicial support for their case against Ireland.